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US Lowest Mortgage Rates.com will help you find a Low Mortgage Interest Rate
Interest Rate -
The percentage of an amount of money that's paid for its use
over a specified time period.
Mortgage rates, that is. The one week up, two weeks
down, two weeks up pattern continues as the markets try to
outguess where the Federal Reserve is going with rates,
fewer people apply for mortgages, and housing sales in some
parts of the country also slide.
Freddie Mac's Weekly Mortgage Market Survey showed an
encouraging little dip for the week ended July 27 as did the
Mortgage Bankers Associations Weekly Mortgage Applications
Survey for the week ended July 28.
Freddie's survey showed a drop of 8 basis points in the
average rate for 30-year fixed rate mortgages to 6.72
percent as well as a decrease in fees and points to 0.3 from
0.5. This is the lowest level for fees and points during all
of 2006.
The 15-year fixed rate mortgage averaged 6.34 percent
compared to 6.41 percent the previous week and fees and
points were unchanged at 0.4. The 5/1-year adjustable rate
morning was down only one basis point to 6.35 percent but
fees and points dropped form 0.6 to 0.4. The 1-year ARM
eased from 5.80 percent to 5.78 percent with fees and points
unchanged at 0.7.
Frank Nothaft, Freddie Mac's vice president and chief
economist stated "Mortgage rates drifted lower this week on
indications that economic growth is moderating .... Remains
under under control and the Fed just may pause raising rates
for a while. Meanwhile, recently released new homes sales
... lower than expected rate. That drop can be traced
directly to higher mortgage rates, which ..... helping to
slow the growth of house prices in 2006."
Rates in actuality have not made much upward progress this
year. The first week in January the following were average
rates:
30-year fixed: 6.21 & 0.5
15-year fixed: 5.76 & 0.5
5/1-year ARM: 5.78 & 0.7
1-year ARM 5.16 & 0.7
Thus the different over seven months of rollercoaster
changes ranges from 51 to 62 basis points.- not exactly a
sea change.
The MBA survey reports similar results for the week. The
30-year fixed-rate mortage was down 7 basis points to 6.62
percent with points (including the origination fee) dropping
from 1.07 to 1.00.
The 15-year fixed-rate mortgage was down a minimal 3 basis
points to 6.28 percent with points also down 7 basis points
to 1.00 and the one-year ARM was the big winner decreasing
from 6.25 percent to 6.18 percent with points down from 0.83
to 0.81.
All rates are for conventional 80 percent loan to value
mortgages.
Mortgage applications as measured by the Market Composit
Index were down 1.2 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis,
the lowest that index has been since May, 2002. On an
unadjusted basis it for 1.4 percent lower than a week
earlier. The index was down 29.0 percent compared to the
same week in 2005.
Refinancing as a share of overall mortgage applications was
up slightly, from 35.6 percent to 37 percent from the
previous week while ARM mortgages were down from 28.6
percent to 27.8 percent. This is the lowest share of
mortgage activity that ARMs have garnered since March 2004. |